Libyan soldier, policemen shot dead in Benghazi

BENGHAZI- A soldier and a policemen were shot dead on Friday in another day of violence targeting security forces in Libya's second city Benghazi, a hospital official said.
The killings come a day after three soldiers were killed in clashes there with jihadist group Ansar al-Sharia, and three more wounded in a subsequent attack.

Separately, another soldier had been killed in a drive-by shooting in broad daylight as he left a cafe with a comrade who escaped unscathed. The details of Friday's killings were sketchy, with a security source saying only that the two men were on duty when they died. Thursday was the last day of a three-day strike to protest the presence of militias in the city, which was the cradle of the 2011 uprising the ousted long-time dictator Moamer Kadhafi. But on Friday, hundreds of people turned out again to denounce the violence, express their support for government forces and denounce extremism. The demonstration was marred when some exploded a homemade bomb near the gathering, lightly wounding one person, an AFP journalist reported. The strike was sparked by a Monday shootout between jihadists and the army that killed seven people and wounded 50. Since Kadhafi was ousted and killed, transitional authorities in the North African nation have been plagued by security problems. They have tried in vain to integrate most former rebels into the regular armed forces, with many militias carving their own fiefdoms, each with its own ideology and regional allegiances. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------